On today’s show… Hyundai gets aggressive with the price on the Ioniq EV, Citroen shows off a good-looking small van concept and why owners of autonomous cars are not going to use them for ride sharing. All that and more coming right up on Autoline Daily.

This is Autoline Daily the show for enthusiasts of the automotive industry.

IONIQ IS PRICED TO SELL
Hyundai is getting aggressive with the prices for the new Ioniq hybrid and electric. The hybrid starts just over $23,000 including destination charges, which undercuts the Prius by a couple of grand. The electric, with 124-miles of range, starts a bit over $30-grand including destination charges but that does not include tax incentives. But you might want to wait on the Electric. Autoblog says an updated EV will be out by 2018 with over 200-miles of range, which would put it right on par with the Chevy Bolt EV.

CITROEN SPACETOURER CONCEPT
Some small vans have pretty goofy styling. But Citroen will have a concept in Geneva that we think looks pretty cool. The SpaceTourer 4X4 E Concept has cute a face that almost seems to invite you inside. Based on the short wheelbase version of the SpaceTourer that’s already in the market, it comes with a 4-wheel drive system. But don’t think this concept would be a slouch off-road, its suspension has been raised nearly 2.5-inches, it comes with front and rear skid plates and the tires are wrapped in snow chains. And don’t be bummed about this being a concept car. Citroen says it could absolutely convert the production version to what you see.

About 30 years ago Ford tried building its own wind tunnel but gave up. Now it’s at it again. That’s coming up next.

GM LOST $20 BILLION ON OPEL
Yesterday we reported on how General Motors could end up selling Opel to PSA. That move comes just as the European market is getting back on its feet. Last year 19.9 million light and heavy vehicles were sold there, up 5.3% from the year before. But GM seems to be giving up on the idea that it can turn Opel around. Bloomberg reports that since 1999 Opel lost $20 billion. And with Brexit looming GM could continue to lose money in Europe for years to come. So it’s understandable why GM would want to cut its loses. Even so, giving up on the European market is nothing more than unconditional surrender, made all the more shocking when you see that Ford turned its European operations around and is now making a billion dollar profit there.

FORD BUILDS WIND TUNNEL
Speaking of Ford, it just announced it’s spending $200 million to build its own wind tunnel not far from its engineering campus just outside of Detroit. The tunnel will have a rolling ground plane and will be able to simulate speeds up to 200 miles an hour. It will also have an environmental chamber to test cars from 40 degrees below zero Fahrenheit up to 140 degrees. Ironically, this is Ford’s second attempt at building its own tunnel. About 30 years ago it sunk the pilings for a tunnel right next to its Product Development Center off Oakwood Boulevard. But in a cost saving move that project was cancelled and everyone promptly forgot about it. The fact that Ford is now building a wind tunnel shows that even with computational fluid dynamics software, simulation is not enough. Physical testing is a critical part of developing cars for better fuel efficiency and longer electric range.

Still to come, if you got an autonomous car would you share it as part of a ride-sharing program? Here’s one expert who says people are just not going to do that.

CHINESE PRONUNCIATIONS
If you travel to different countries you can be surprised by the different pronunciations of car names. Recently we had Michael Dunne in the studio for an upcoming Autoline This Week about China, and he shared with us how some of familiar car brands we know get pronounced in China. For example Buick become Bie-keh. Cadillac becomes Ka-dee-la-keh. Ford is pronounced Fu-teh. And GM is Tong Yong. I’m sure you all Mandarin speakers out there will cringe at the way I said that, but for everyone else, there’s your Chinese lesson for the day.

WILL AUTONOMOUS OWNERS SHARE?
Ride sharing companies such as Uber and Lyft are growing fast. Autonomous cars are just a few years away. But will owners of autonomous cars allowed them to be used for ride sharing or car sharing? Alexander Mankowsky is a futurist who works for Mercedes-Benz. He’s one of my guests on Autoline This Week. And in the following clip he explains why people are not going to share their autonomous cars.

(Clip from Autoline This Week can only be viewed in the video version of today’s show.)

We shot that show at CES and it is jam packed with great information on future automotive technology. We’ll post it on the Autoline website Thursday afternoon.

And with that we wrap up today’s report. Thanks for watching and please join us again tomorrow.

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In my way of thinking “Ride Sharing” is public transportation. If people do not own it then they do not care about it! If I would own an autonomous vehicle “Hell No” would I let anyone other than family drive it. People trash everything from hotel rooms to public spaces.
You would need to install surveillance camera in the vehicle to record any mischief being done by others. So I agree with your Futurist on this point.

mobility services will find the most success in higher population areas. Housing in those areas is very expensive when compared to the rest of the country. With over 50% of the US population living in the southwest of CA, New England, and southern Florida area it looks like a good bet. The rest of the car sales will come from “fly over” country. And as car prices go up, those sales may fall.

Sorry John, but you’ll have to explain to my why the Nissan NV200 has “goofy styling” compared to the “cute face” of the Citroen SpaceTourer 4X4 E Concept. I just don’t see it. In fact, I think the current generation of small, medium and large vans from major manufacturers are a vast improvement in every way over the brick-like Detroit boxes of old.

The best Ioniq will be the pure electric. Hybrids should have power splitter systems like Toyota and Ford, not 6-speed DCT’s. Using a DCT in a hybrid makes it much more complex, mechanically, while making it less smooth operating.

I’m not so sure whether asking if owners of autonomous cars will share their vehicle is the right question. Indeed, it may be hardly worth asking. If the owners of non-autonomous cars won’t share, how much difference will a KITT car make? And just for kicks and giggles, Alexander seems to have forgotten (or perhaps he just isn’t aware) but people DO “ride-share” their living rooms. It’s called Airbnb! Perhaps the question should the go something like this, “Will those same folks who are willing to “ride-share” their living rooms also be willing to share their cars?”

Lex, I agree. As an example, I bought my Vanden Plas after the kids went to college. Now as young adults, they love the back seat of the Vanden Plas (from the rear DVD to the picnic trays, to the heaters and recliners), and ask why I didn’t get it when they were younger. Simple, they would have trashed it.

To a much greater extent, rider sharers won’t respect my values of maintaining a clean interior. Far too many public transportation riders believe their conveyances are mobile trash cans. Well, not my car!!!

Ride sharing not in my cars!! Even the rental cars that I have driven are borderline clean inside. Wipe down the steering wheel before driving off and you will see what I mean. Coffee stains, dirty seats and floors, trash everywhere and that is with the big guys like Hertz. Let the pigs ride mass transit.

Thanks John, #13; as has been said before, the electrics won’t make (major) in-roads till the batteries come down (further) in price. These vehicles need to be on-par with ICE (cost-wise) before their other advantages can be realized. So far, most of the advantage is being, so called, green, which isn’t entirely true.

#17, Brett. I couldn’t agree with you more.
That’s how I see the people that are interested in car sharing subscribe to the ownership model that has worked so well under the fractional ownership model of private aircraft. The vehicle’s (aircraft) are maintained and kept very clean due to the respect of the partners involved in the agreement.

But I still believe that the vast majority of people who elect to sign a fractional ownership agreement, car sharing agreement, will be based in cities where it makes more economical sense to share rather than own.

The suburbs or more rural areas, like where I live, will most likely opt for for full ownership. But who really knows, we’ll have to wait and see how creative the financing companies can get when it comes to automobiles in the future.

Would fractional ownership work with cars, at least cars for “normal: use like commuting? Wouldn’t there be a lot of times that multiple partners would need the car at the same time? Maybe it would work to have multiple, small partial ownerships. Still, in urban areas, I’d think short term rentals, like zipcar would work better. Or does zipcar still exist?

The place I can see fractional ownership working would be for “cars as toys,” like very expensive exotics. You could drive a $.5M exotic once every two weeks, for the price of a Corvette. I’d rather just own the Corvette, but I can see the appeal of fractional ownership of an exotic.

I could see fractional ownership working well in high density areas due to the 24hr nature of said places. Working at a hospital, there are shifts around the clock. I could easily see a vehicle picking up one or more 2nd or 3rd shift employees on the way to work where the vehicle would drop off and then pick up the first shifters ready to go home. The only question would be is the vehicle employee owned or owned by some company with monthly service subscription.